‘Zoe, yes. I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you. I’ve talked
to my sister; she’s delighted to have her, says she can be
genuinely useful to her, not just be hanging around, folding
up Tshirts.’
‘Marvellous. I think it would be best if the invitation
came from Bella, don’t you? Otherwise she’ll (a) suspect us
of collusion and (b) be much less likely to want to go.’
‘Sure. I’ll tell Bella to call.’
‘There’s something else. Romilly is playing an important
solo in the school concert second week in July. Can you be
sure to be available?’
‘Of course. Well, crises permitting. I’m writing it down
right now. Give her a big hug from me.’
‘I will. If only Marc could come too,’ she said and sighed.
But, Marc was lost somewhere — not literally, as she prayed
earnestly every night — with several friends on a vacational
expedition to Nepal and the Himalayas, and would not
return to civilisation until the summer was over and he
went back to Harvard.
‘Well, there it is. He’s having a marvellous time.’
‘I know, but—’
‘Cut the apron strings, Marianne. I’m always telling you
that.’
He was, but it was easy for him. He saw a lot of Marc
anyway; she hardly ever did these days. And she found that
hard. She and Marc had been so close once; now she came a
poor second in his life, to the long string of leggy blondes
whom he seemed to attract so easily.
‘Anyway, he’s done extraordinarily well in his exams.
Second highest marks in his year. He’ll be heading up this
firm in a couple of decades, no doubt about that.’
‘No doubt,’ said Marianne, hearing an edge in her voice,
hating herself for it. Of course Marc should inherit
Muirhead Templeman, and he was clearly going to be a
brilliant lawyer in his own right. It was just that she
nurtured a dream of having him move to London to take
up a career there. Unlikely, but … Well, you couldn’t
have everything. And she certainly had pretty close to it.
Sandy Trelawny, unlike Marianne Muirhead, had had a bad
day. An order he had been banking on had fallen through,
his rather elderly Volvo had been most uncharacteristically
overheating all the way home from Birmingham, which
would no doubt mean an expensive trip to the garage, and
he had had a rather heavy letter from the bank, expressing
the usual pained surprise that his account had gone over its
agreed limit. He had a throbbing headache, and he had
been looking forward to getting home to Louise and Dickon, his wife and small son, and relaxing in front of the television. They had been away, visiting Louise’s parents for
a couple of days.
Only, as he walked into the house, raising his nose
hopefully for one of the delicious garlicky smells that meant
supper was well on its way, he realised the day was going to
continue on its inexorably unpleasant way. For Louise was
not upstairs bathing four-year-old Dickon, and nor was she
reading to him, as she did on the very good days — in fact,
Dickon was nowhere to be seen. Nor was she in the
kitchen, creating the delicious garlicky smell that would be supper as she did on the fair to middling days. She was
sitting in front of the television, watching Neighbours.
Neighbours days were the worst - no, not quite the worst;
Oprah Winfrey and Ricki Lake days were the very worst. If
he found Louise sitting gazing mesmerised into the riff
raffish evangelism of those programmes, he knew things
were going to be very terrible. Not that there had been
many of those days lately, or even a Neighbours one. But
there was one now.
Sandy braced himself physically, a reflex reaction from
his army days, took a deep breath and forced a cheerfulness
into his voice. ‘Darling! Hallo! Lovely to have you home.
How was your mum? I’ve missed you.’
Louise turned her face to him; it was white, her eyes
swollen with crying. Sandy was shocked, almost fearful. She
hadn’t looked as bad as that for a long time.
‘Darling, whatever’s the matter?’
‘It’s Mummy,’ she said, her voice shaky, raw with grief,
totally devoid of its lovely musical huskiness. ‘She’s got
cancer, Sandy. She’s probably going to — to die.’
And Sandy, staring at her in horror, felt a pang of
absolute panic, not only at the thought of losing Anna
Madison, so lovely, so young still, a source of such wisdom
and strength and so very dear to him, but at what the
dealing of this new blow would do to Louise. And how he
was going to be able to endure it.
‘Have you talked to Octavia?’ was all he could think of
to say.
‘You look lovely,’ said Tom, ‘and I owe you a big thank
you. You’re wonderful.’
‘What for?’
‘Well, you’ve solved poor Bob’s problem for him. About
the photo shoot, remember?’
‘Of course. What did I say?’
‘That he should use it as a bargaining point.’
‘What, with Maureen?’
‘No, darling, not with Maureen. Something much more
important. You see - ah, Jim. And Susan. How nice. Come
in and sit down. How are you both? Lovely to see you
again. You remember my wife, Octavia, don’t you?’
‘Yes, of course.’ Jim Draper shook Octavia’s hand
vigorously. ‘Very good to see you here, Octavia. Susan was
hoping you’d be able to make it. She wants to talk to you
about your charity work, don’t you, love? Wondered if you
could help her with something, as a matter of fact.’
Octavia’s heart began to sink. The evening was going to
be even longer than she had thought.
The Drapers owned a chain of local freesheet newspapers
and were in the process of acquiring a local radio station.
They were successful and ambitious, and tediously self
congratulating. Susan Draper, Jim told them proudly over
their first drink, had absolute editorial control over all the
papers. ‘She used to be women’s editor of the Eastern
Morning News, a very big job. She was about to come up here to Fleet Street, only she had the misfortune to meet
me.’
‘Well, Fleet Street’s loss was your gain,’ said Tom.
‘Yes, but the loss of her career really hurt her,’ said Jim
Draper, ‘so it’s marvellous she’s been able to pick it up again
now. You’re lucky, Octavia - that never happened to you,
I suppose. Although, as I understand it, you and your
husband work very closely together, rather like ourselves.’
‘Well, not exactly,’ said Octavia carefully, ‘but our paths
do cross quite a bit.’
‘And how does that work exactly?’ said Susan Draper.
‘Oh, it’s a bit complicated.’
‘No, do tell me. It would make a feature for our papers.’
‘That’s a very good idea, love,’ said Jim Draper, beaming
proudly at her, ‘and Susan would do the interview herself she
does that when it’s a really big project. Would help
your business as well, I expect, Octavia, bit of publicity.
What do you think?’
‘That would be a — a very interesting idea,’ said Octavia,
trying to sound enthusiastic.
It was a long evening; the Drapers ate their way through
the menu, insisting on the cheese board as well as the fruit
trolley, and drank a great deal as well. It must be costing
hundreds, thought Octavia, smiling sweetly at Jim Draper
over her iced water and fresh raspberries as he told her how
lucky she was not to put on weight. ‘I have a terrific battle,
don’t I, love?’ he said, crunching into a biscuit ladled with
both butter and Brie.
‘You do, yes. Octavia, you must go to a lot of charity
functions. Have you ever met Princess Diana?’
‘No,’ said Octavia, ‘I never have. Other big names of
course …’
‘Like?’
‘Well, the Duchess of Gloucester is a great favourite of
ours. Princess Anne is wonderful, and—’
‘What I would really like,’ said Susan Draper, leaning
forward and blowing a fog of smoke into Octavia’s face ‘God, I must give this up — what I would really like is to write an article about a big charity bash. Now I wonder if
you could ever see your way to arranging for me to attend
one? And meeting one of those ladies?’
‘It really is rather unlikely,’ said Octavia. There was a
point beyond which she was not prepared to compromise
herself. ‘It’s an unwritten part of the deal that the royals
particularly are given privacy inside the functions. Otherwise,
they just won’t do it. Naturally.’
‘Yes, well, of course I can see that. But I do assure you I
would be extremely discreet. Could you at least think about
it for me?’
‘I will think about it,’ said Octavia, ‘but—’
‘Susan, leave off,’ said Jim Draper unexpectedly. ‘You
mustn’t force Octavia’s hand if she doesn’t want it. She and
Tom have been very cooperative over the feature, and
given us a wonderful evening, and I found all that she had
to tell us about those charity auctions absolutely fascinating.
Privileged information, I’d say, Octavia! Now, Tom, I’ve
been looking at all the stuff you’ve given me about your
company and I must say I’m very impressed. I liked your
partner too, and the executive you say we’d be working
with. All very pleasant people. Now your charges are high,
no doubt about it, but we do need some advice, all this
legislation is very complex, and I’m prepared to go so far as
to say that I would like to see us doing business with you — maybe in three to six months’ time. Can’t be fairer than that, can I? Just have to dot the t’s and cross the i’s with the
rest of my board — that’s the mother-in-law and the cat — no, only joking. Oh, now yes, I could force down another of those brandies, if you twisted my arm
‘My darling you were magnificent,’ said Tom, returning to
the table with a sigh of exhaustion, picking up his brandy
glass swirling it round. ‘It was you who did it really, you
know. Tipped the balance. How can I thank you?’
‘By getting me off the hook with that woman’s
interview,’ said Octavia.
‘Of course I will. No problem. Promise.’
‘And telling me about Bob’s solution. I couldn’t think of
anything else all evening.’
‘Like several others, I hope,’ said Tom. ‘Listen…’
Octavia listened. When he had finished she looked at
him and smiled. ‘And I thought of that? How brilliant.’
‘ We thought of it. And we are brilliant. A brilliant team.
Why don’t you have a drink just for once?’
‘Oh, all right,’ said Octavia. ‘A glass of champagne would
be very nice. And I forgot to tell you, I’ve decided to go
with Michael Carlton’s sponsorship offer. Providing we can
make it work, and I don’t have to compromise myself with
my client too much. I’m still a bit unhappy about that.’
‘Don’t be. It’ll be fine.’
‘I hope so. And I have to tell you, I do worry about his
development.’
‘But why? I don’t understand.’
‘Because you know how much I hate the wrecking of
the countryside.’
‘Octavia! It’s only a few houses. People have to live
somewhere.’
‘Yes, I know, but not in little brick boxes, set down on
the graves of trees. I hate it, and I hate the thought of being,
however slightly, part of it.’
‘Maybe you won’t be,’ he said.
‘You mean he might not get his planning permission?’
‘Well - yes.’
‘I bet he will,’ she said soberly, ‘they always do.’
‘Think we’re going to get that account?’ said Aubrey
Cotterill casually. He and Tom were sitting in the
boardroom, having breakfasted with a couple of fairly
senior civil servants, in order to discuss the possibility of any
real likelihood of a differential in car taxation levels. They
were considering launching a campaign on the subject,
pulling together any of their clients with a vested interest in
the subject; it was the fun side of lobbying, as Tom often
said.
‘Oh, yes. I’m pretty confident,’ said Tom. ‘I had dinner
with the Drapers last night and they more or less committed
themselves. Just a matter of talking the board round, as Jim
Draper put it. I think that mostly means the Drapers
themselves.’
‘Good. We’ve put a lot of money into getting it. Was
Octavia there?’
‘Yes. She was great. I’d say she tipped the balance.’
‘Great. You’re a lucky man, Tom, having her.’
‘I know it,’ said Tom soberly.
‘Apart from her innate instincts for pulling them in,
prospective clients are always so charmed by her and her
own success. Well, I have to say that’s something of a relief.
Or will be when they’ve signed. I’m a cautious old biddy, as
you know.’ He reached for the cigarette box that was on
the table, pulled one out, lit it, inhaled hard.
Tom looked at him thoughtfully. Aubrey was usually the
more relaxed of the two of them, despite a ferocious
intellect. He was a Winchester Scholar, with a First in
Greats, divorced, after a brief, unhappy marriage, rotund,
balding, slightly baby faced, but with immense charm and a
rather surprising success with women; Octavia was very
fond of him.
‘We really do need that account, Tom,’ he said suddenly,